Each time an issue of acting tough on terrorists, the so-called abject surrender of NDA government under Vajpayee ji is brought up. This article by Sri Kanchan Gupta throws light about the events that transpired. It is the people’s will that makes a government strong and stand up ! Was our Nation upto it ?

Was it really an ‘abject surrender’ by the NDA Government?

There have been innumerable communal riots in India, nearly all of them in States ruled by the Congress at the time of the violence, yet everybody loves to pretend that blood was shed in the name of religion for the first time in Gujarat in 2002 and that the BJP Government headed by Mr Narendra Modi must bear the burden of the cross.

Similarly, nobody remembers the various incidents of Indian Airlines aircraft being hijacked when the Congress was in power at the Centre, the deals that were struck to rescue the hostages, and the compromises that were made at the expense of India’s dignity and honour. But everybody remembers the hijacking of IC 814 and nearly a decade after the incident, many people still hold the BJP-led NDA Government responsible for the ‘shameful’ denouement.

The Indian Airlines flight from Kathmandu to New Delhi, designated IC 814, with 178 passengers and 11 crew members on board, was hijacked on Christmas Eve, 1999, a short while after it took-off from Tribhuvan International Airport; by then, the aircraft had entered Indian airspace. Nine years later to the day, with an entire generation coming of age, it would be in order to recall some facts and place others on record.

In 1999 I was serving as an aide to Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in the PMO, and I still have vivid memories of the tumultuous week between Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. Mr Vajpayee had gone out of Delhi on an official tour; I had accompanied him along with other officials of the PMO. The hijacking of IC 814 occurred while we were returning to Delhi in one of the two Indian Air Force Boeings which, in those days, were used by the Prime Minister for travel within the country.

Curiously, the initial information about IC 814 being hijacked, of which the IAF was believed to have been aware, was not communicated to the pilot of the Prime Minister’s aircraft. As a result, Mr Vajpayee and his aides remained unaware of the hijacking till reaching Delhi. This caused some amount of controversy later.

It was not possible for anybody else to have contacted us while we were in midair. It’s strange but true that the Prime Minister of India would be incommunicado while on a flight because neither the ageing IAF Boeings nor the Air India Jumbos, used for official travel abroad (in those days), had satellite phone facilities.

By the time our aircraft landed in Delhi, it was around 7:00 pm, a full hour and 40 minutes since the hijacking of IC 814. After disembarking from the aircraft in the VIP bay of Palam Technical Area, we were surprised to find National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra waiting at the foot of the ladder. He led Mr Vajpayee aside and gave him the news. They got into the Prime Minister’s car and it sped out of the Technical Area. Some of us followed Mr. Vajpayee to Race Course Road, as was the normal routine.

On our way to the Prime Minister’s residence, colleagues in the PMO provided us with the basic details. The Kathmandu-Delhi flight had been commandeered by five hijackers (later identified as Ibrahim Athar, resident of Bahawalpur, Shahid Akhtar Sayed, Gulshan Iqbal, resident of Karachi, Sunny Ahmed Qazi, resident of Defence Area, Karachi, Mistri Zahoor Ibrahim, resident of Akhtar Colony, Karachi, and Shakir, resident of Sukkur City) at 5:20 pm; there were 189 passengers and crew members on board; and that the aircraft was heading towards Lahore.

At the Prime Minister’s residence, senior Ministers and Secretaries had already been summoned for an emergency meeting. Mr Mishra left for the crisis control room that had been set up at Rajiv Bhavan. In between meetings, Mr Vajpayee instructed his personal staff to cancel all celebrations planned for December 25, his birthday. The Cabinet Committee on Security met late into the night as our long vigil began.

Meanwhile, we were informed that the pilot of IC 814 had been denied permission to land at Lahore airport. With fuel running low, he was heading for Amritsar. Officials at Raja Sansi Airport were immediately alerted and told to prevent the plane from taking off after it had landed there.

The hijacked plane landed at Amritsar and remained parked on the tarmac for nearly 45 minutes. The hijackers demanded that the aircraft be refuelled. The airport officials ran around like so many headless chickens, totally clueless about what was to be done in a crisis situation.

Desperate calls were made to the officials at Raja Sansi Airport to somehow stall the refuelling and prevent the plane from taking off. The officials just failed to respond with alacrity. At one point, an exasperated Jaswant Singh, if memory serves me right, grabbed the phone and pleaded with an official, “Just drive a heavy vehicle, a fuel truck or a road roller or whatever you have, onto the runway and park it there.” But all this was to no avail.

The National Security Guards, whose job it is to deal with hostage situations, were alerted immediately after news first came in of IC 814 being hijacked; they were reportedly asked to stand by for any emergency. The Home Ministry was again alerted when it became obvious that after being denied permission to land at Lahore, the pilot was heading towards Amritsar.

Yet, despite IC 814 remaining parked at Amritsar for three-quarters of an hour, the NSG commandos failed to reach the aircraft. There are two versions as to why the NSG didn’t show up: First, they were waiting for an aircraft to ferry them from Delhi to Amritsar; second, they were caught in a traffic jam between Manesar and Delhi airport. The real story was never known!

The hijackers, anticipating commando action, first stabbed a passenger, Rupin Katyal (he had gone to Kathmandu with his newly wedded wife for their honeymoon; had they not extended their stay by a couple of days, they wouldn’t have been on the ill-fated flight) to show that they meant business, and then forced the pilot to take off from Amritsar. With almost empty fuel tanks, the pilot had no other option but to make another attempt to land at Lahore airport. Once again he was denied permission and all the lights, including those on the runway, were switched off. He nonetheless went ahead and landed at Lahore airport, showing remarkable skill and courage.

Mr Jaswant Singh spoke to the Pakistani Foreign Minister and pleaded with him to prevent the aircraft from taking off again. But the Pakistanis would have nothing of it (they wanted to distance themselves from the hijacking so that they could claim later that there was no Pakistan connection) and wanted IC 814 off their soil and out of their airspace as soon as possible. So, they refuelled the aircraft after which the hijackers forced the pilot to head for Dubai.

At Dubai, too, officials were reluctant to allow the aircraft to land. It required all the persuasive skills of Mr Jaswant Singh and our then Ambassador to UAE, Mr KC Singh, to secure landing permission. There was some negotiation with the hijackers through UAE officials and they allowed 13 women and 11 children to disembark. Rupin Katyal had by then bled to death. His body was offloaded. His widow remained a hostage till the end.

On the morning of December 25, the aircraft left Dubai and headed towards Afghanistan. It landed at Kandahar Airport, which had one serviceable runway, a sort of ATC and a couple of shanties. The rest of the airport was in a shambles, without power and water supply, a trophy commemorating the Taliban’s rule.

On Christmas Eve, after news of the hijacking broke, there was stunned all-round silence. But by noon on December 25, orchestrated protests outside the Prime Minister’s residence began, with women beating their chests and tearing their clothes. The crowd swelled by the hour as the day progressed.

Ms Brinda Karat came to commiserate with the relatives of the hostages who were camping outside the main gate of 7, Race Course Road. In fact, she became a regular visitor over the next few days. There was a steady clamour that the Government should pay any price to bring the hostages back home, safe and sound. This continued till December 30.

One evening, the Prime Minister asked his staff to let the families come in so that they could be told about the Government’s efforts to secure the hostages’ release. By then negotiations had begun and Mullah Omar had got into the act through his ‘Foreign Minister’, Muttavakil. The hijackers wanted 36 terrorists, held in various Indian jails, to be freed or else they would blow up the aircraft with the hostages.

No senior Minister in the CCS was willing to meet the families. Mr Jaswant Singh volunteered to do so. He asked me to accompany him to the canopy under which the families had gathered. Once there, we were literally mobbed. He tried to explain the situation but was shouted down.

“We want our relatives back. What difference does it make to us what you have to give the hijackers?” a man shouted. “We don’t care if you have to give away Kashmir,” a woman screamed and others took up the refrain, chanting: “Kashmir de do, kuchh bhi de do, hamare logon ko ghar wapas lao.” Another woman sobbed, “Mera beta… hai mera beta…” and made a great show of fainting of grief.

To his credit, Mr Jaswant Singh made bold to suggest that the Government had to keep the nation’s interest in mind, that we could not be seen to be giving in to the hijackers, or words to that effect, in chaste Hindi. That fetched him abuse and rebuke. “Bhaand me jaaye desh aur bhaand me jaaye desh ka hit. (To hell with the country and national interest),” many in the crowd shouted back. Stumped by the response, Mr Jaswant Singh could merely promise that the Government would do everything possible.

I do not remember the exact date, but sometime during the crisis, Mr Jaswant Singh was asked to hold a Press conference to brief the media. While the briefing was on at the Press Information Bureau hall in Shastri Bhavan, some families of the hostages barged in and started shouting slogans. They were led by one Sanjiv Chibber, who, I was later told, was a ‘noted surgeon’: He claimed six of his relatives were among the hostages.

Dr Chibber wanted all 36 terrorists named by the hijackers to be released immediately. He reminded everybody in the hall that in the past terrorists had been released from prison to secure the freedom of Ms Rubayya Sayeed, daughter of Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, while he was Home Minister in VP Singh’s Government. “Why can’t you release the terrorists now when our relatives are being held hostage?” he demanded. And then we heard the familiar refrain: “Give away Kashmir, give them anything they want, we don’t give a damn.”

On another evening, there was a surprise visitor at the PMO: The widow of Squadron Leader Ajay Ahuja, whose plane was shot down during the Kargil war. She insisted that she should be taken to meet the relatives of the hostages. At Race Course Road, she spoke to mediapersons and the hostages’ relatives, explaining why India must not be seen giving in to the hijackers, that it was a question of national honour, and gave her own example of fortitude in the face of adversity.

“She has become a widow, now she wants others to become widows. Who is she to lecture us? Yeh kahan se aayi?” someone shouted from the crowd. Others heckled her. The young widow stood her ground, displaying great dignity and courage. As the mood turned increasingly ugly, she had to be led away. Similar appeals were made by others who had lost their sons, husbands and fathers in the Kargil war that summer. Col Virendra Thapar, whose son Lt Vijayant Thapar was martyred in the war, made a fervent appeal for people to stand united against the hijackers. It fell on deaf ears.

The media made out that the overwhelming majority of Indians were with the relatives of the hostages and shared their view that no price was too big to secure the hostages’ freedom. The Congress kept on slyly insisting, “We are with the Government and will support whatever it does for a resolution of the crisis and to ensure the safety of the hostages. But the Government must explain its failure.” Harkishen Singh Surjeet and other Opposition politicians issued similar ambiguous statements.

By December 28, the Government’s negotiators had struck a deal with the hijackers: They would free the hostages in exchange of three dreaded terrorists — Maulana Masood Azhar, Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar and Ahmed Omar Sheikh — facing various charges of terrorism.

The CCS met frequently, several times a day, and discussed the entire process threadbare. The Home Minister, the Defence Minister and the Foreign Minister, apart from the National Security Adviser and the Prime Minister, were present at every meeting. The deal was further fine-tuned, the Home Ministry completed the necessary paper work, and two Indian Airlines aircraft were placed on standby to ferry the terrorists to Kandahar and fetch the hostages.

On December 31, the two aircraft left Delhi airport early in the morning. Mr Jaswant Singh was on board one of them. Did his ministerial colleagues know that he would travel to Kandahar? More important, was the Prime Minister aware of it? The answer is both yes and no.

Mr Jaswant Singh had mentioned his decision to go to Kandahar to personally oversee the release of hostages and to ensure there was no last-minute problem. He was honour-bound to do so, he is believed to have said, since he had promised the relatives of the hostages that no harm would come their way. It is possible that nobody thought he was serious about his plan. It is equally possible that others turned on him when the ‘popular mood’ and the Congress turned against the Government for its ‘abject surrender’.

On New Year’s eve, the hostages were flown back to Delhi. By New Year’s day, the Government was under attack for giving in to the hijackers’ demand! Since then, this ‘shameful surrender’ is held against the NDA and Mr Jaswant Singh is painted as the villain of the piece.

Could the Kandahar episode have ended any other way? Were an Indian aircraft to be hijacked again, would we respond any differently? Not really. As a nation we do not have the guts to stand up to terrorism. We cannot take hits and suffer casualties. We start counting our dead even before a battle has been won or lost. We make a great show of honouring those who die on the battlefield and lionise brave hearts of history, but we do not want our children to follow in their footsteps.

We are, if truth be told, a nation of cowards who don’t have the courage to admit their weakness but are happy to blame a well-meaning politician who, perhaps, takes his regimental motto of ‘Izzat aur Iqbal’ rather too seriously.

Arnold Toynbee writes ‘ What is Pakistan ? it was the first successful step in this 20th century to realize their ( Muslims) 1200 year old dream of complete subjugation of this country.’

Inspite of all its internal issues, Pakistan continues to harbour the dream of defeating Bharat & the Hindus. The video of the terrorist who was involved in the suicide attack in Pulwama has been shared extensively over whatsapp. While it is clear that he was the mimic & the voice was someone else’s, the words are important. He wages war on Hindustan the home of whom he calls as Mushriks ( polytheists ) & gaumootra drinking persons which is obviously the Hindus. He also accuses the Muslims who have either befriended the Hindus or are not practising Islam rigorously.

As expected, many TV channels ran debates on the dastardly act of terror. While there were many baying for revenge, there were some saying that talks are the solution and so on….

In the midst of one such discussion, one person who claimed to be a Kargil war veteran said that we must investigate why the local-bred person became a fidayeen. He spoke about politics etc but strangely did not fix the problem on indoctrination. Jehad is a world-wide phenomena but the apologists brush away the core issues of indoctrination of Ayats from the Qu’ raan stating there are bad people and good people and terror has no religion etc… . When it was happening in Bharat, the world ignored . After 9/11, US woke up and now Europe too is awakening to this grave danger.

The sentiment in the entire nation is baying for revenge & the Prime Minister, Sri Narendra Modi has given an assurance with our support, the strongest action will be taken and that he has given the forces a free hand to do so. Lets hope & pray the government lives up to its promise.

But an important Question is what the common person must do ?

A few To Do’s

Eternal Vigilance is the price of freedom. Awareness is a common responsibility. Awareness about what is being taught in the so-called schools of religion of peace

Question the apologists. There are many who would want to brush away any discussion regarding what causes radicalisation – The points of indoctrination etc. Do Not allow it be brushed away.

Have open discussions on issues concerning the entire nation with friends irrespective of religious affiliations. After all the national security is paramount and everyone is a stakeholder in it.

Educate family & extended family members who have for long not been exposed to the perils and thoughts of these ideologies camouflaged in the guise of religion.

Read some important books on these subjects – Quranic concept of War, World of Fatwas, Calcutta Quran Petition, Understanding Islam through Hadis, Jehad or the Doctrine of war.

Some people are bound to say that ” My friends are not like that”. ofcourse they are not ! But, they don’t matter because the mobs or fidayeens who attack are not governed by your friend But believe what the version of the mullah / moulvi. Therefore, believe what the so-called “religious teacher” is saying, because that is what matters.

Support the armed forces ( including paramilitary ) by whatever means possible.

Devote a few hours daily to connect to other members in the society esp youth and sensitise them on aspects of national security.

Get into small groups in locality & have Raksha samitis.

…And Next year lets pray that we as a nation still remember 14th February for the sacrifice of these Veer Jawans and not for some fictitious saint who has been marketed by the consumer goods companies !!

Ofcourse the State is there to protect us but a Strong society is a bigger deterrent !

Ayush Nadimpalli

An excerpt from the Quraanic Concept of War by Brig S.K. Mallik of Pakistan

” Terror is not a means of imposing decision upon the enemy; it is the decision wewish to impose . . . .” Malik’s divine principal of Islamic warfare may be restated as“strike terror; never feel terror.” The ultimate objective of this form of warfare “revolvesaround the human heart, [the enemies] soul, spirit, and Faith.”56 Terror “can be instilledonly if the opponent’s Faith is destroyed . . . . It is essential in the ultimate analysis, to dislocate [the enemies] Faith.” Those who are firm in their religious conviction are immuneto terror, “a weak Faith offers inroads to terror.” Therefore, as part of preparations for jihad, actions will be oriented on weakening the non-Islamic’s “Faith,” while strengthening the Islamic’s. What that weakening or “dislocation” entails in practice remainsambiguous. Malik concludes, “Psychological dislocation is temporary; spiritual dislocation is permanent.” The soul of man can only be touched by terror.”

Why do we celebrate Nehru Jayanti as Children’s Day? We have a ready-made answer with a punch quote of Nehru already on hands: Because Nehru was known for his love for children and was fondly called Chacha Nehru! And Nehru once said, “The children of today will make the India of tomorrow. The way we bring them up will determine the future of the country”. Here goes the narrative which has been established in the public domain over the years. According to the popular belief, after the death of Jawaharlal Nehru in 1964, it was unanimously decided to celebrate his birthday as Children’s Day in India.

But the reality is something else. It is a widely held misconception that November 14 is celebrated as Children’s Day after the death of Nehru. Reports and documents suggest that Nehru’s birthday was celebrated as Children’s day in 1955! Who did issue order to celebrate Nehru’s birthday as children’s day? Indeed, it was declared by the then Prime Minister of India, none other than Chacha Nehru! Interestingly, it had nothing to do with children or Chachaji’s eternal love and affections for India’s young buds. It was merely a public relations exercise, organised to please his Soviet Union masters Comrades Bulganin and Khrushchev who embarked on an India visit during that time.

Organiser Weekly, dated November 21, 1955, came out with a stinging editorial, penned by the then editor and stalwart journalist KR Malkani, targeting Jawaharlal Nehru for misusing the entire educational machinery to build up his dictatorship. Comparing Nehru’s humbug with that of Adolf Hitler, the editorial states, “Preparations to celebrate Pt. Nehru’s birthday and the Russian leaders’ arrival have set us thinking. It has been said of Hitler that he built up his dictatorship on the devotion of “Hitler Youth” organisation. It is well known that he assumed dictatorial powers without much amending the Weimer Constitution, that most perfect of democratic instruments. We must confess that the above preparations remind us of the “Hitler Jugend “, Organiser hit out at Nehru.

“For three weeks now, the entire educational machinery in the capital has been put out of gear. Since a number of students from every class in almost all the schools has been out rehearsing and re-rehearsing their allotted role for couple of hours every day, tuition has almost ground to a halt,” the editorial said.

The editorial condemns the repeated child rights violation occurred in the name of Children’s Day celebration as truckload of Delhi students, both boys and girls, had been daily transported to Kutub Minar ground for lessons in drilling, smiling, garlanding, clapping and shouting slogans!

“The official explanation is that they are observing Children’s Day. Wasting children’s education for three weeks is a rather wonderful way of celebrating Children’s Day. Nor is it clear why Pt. Nehru’s birthday should have been particularly selected for observation as ‘Children’s Day’, Shri Malkani wonders! “If any living dignitary’s birthday has to be celebrated on a national scale, the only right and indeed obvious, choice would be that of Rashtrapati’s,” he says.

The visionary journalist raised his concerns, asking whether the annual birthday celebration of Nehru continues into perpetuity, that later turned out to be true. “Also, is it the idea that ‘Nehru Jayanti” should be observed as Children’s Day forever hereafter? Or the Children’s Day chance with every incoming Premier’s birthday?,” he asks.

Interestingly, the editorial puts forth another suggestion that the right day for Children’s Day would be Krishna Janmashtami that birthday of the great child of all times-Sri Bala Krishna. Apart from Organiser, On November 14, 1956, The Times of India reported the Children’s Day: “Nearly 100,000 children assembled at the National Stadium today to participate in a Children’s Day rally, which coincided with the Prime Minister’s 67th birthday celebrations.” This is a new variant of the invisible colonialism which Nehru warned against, in his ‘Discovery of India’. It is high time to review and reexamine the readymade answers cooked up by so-called Nehruvians, for our frequently asked questions including, ‘why do we celebrate Nehru Jayanti as Children’s Day?’

How Shall We Recover our Lost Intellectual Freedom

Sri Aurobindo says " How shall we recover our lost intellectual freedom? By reversing, for the time being, the process by which we lost it, by liberating our minds in all subjects from the thralldom to authority. The Anglicized ask us to abandon authority, revolt against superstition to have free minds. What they mean is that we should renounce authority of the Vedas for Max Muller, the Monism of Sankara for the Monism of Haeckel, the dogmatisms of Pandits for the dogmatisms of European thinkers, scientists and scholars. Let us break our chains in order to be free, in the name of truth, not in the name of Europe.

Our first necessity, if India is to survive and do her appointed work in the world, is that the youth of India should learn to think, - to think on all subjects, to think independently, fruitfully, going to the heart of things, not stopped by their surface, free of prejudgments, shearing sophism and prejudice asunder as with a sharp sword, smiting down obscurantism of all kinds as with the mace of Bhima…”.